Many small to mid-sized business owners in Dallas Fort Worth turn over duties like shopping for more affordable group health insurance quotes to their administrative assistants. This is an acceptable and perfectly normal practice.
Yet, an administrative assistant is often left with little cbdwardcom other from their boss other than “find a group health plan in Texas that is more affordable than what we have,” or to “shop around to find the best rates.” This article is designed to give the administrative assistance some basic information that can help the overall process and the results of shopping around for group health insurance.
First of all, businesses should know that group health insurance is a highly regulated and very competitive business. Four health insurance carriers, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas, United Healthcare, Aetna and Unicare represent about 80 % of the small group health insurance market in Texas. Each of these four group health insurance companies are financially “A rated, and have their own extensive PPO health care provider networks throughout the state.
Many of the other group health insurance companies that offer health plans “rent” another company’s PPO healthcare provider network. Some of these other health insurance companies are not as financially strong, with an AM Best rating of less than “A.” While many of these other group health insurance companies are good companies, a company should be sure to review plans from the top four companies first and should have a good reason why to consider another company’s plans.
If a business owner or administrative assistant picks up the phone and contacts each insurance company individually, they will waste considerable time and effort, and will not get any better rates than if they contacted a competent group health insurance broker who represents all or several companies.
Likewise, if a business owner or administrative assistant surfs the net and fills out a form with their company’s contact information and employee census information in order to get a quote, they can be assured of getting several calls a day for months, as that online form that they filled out was likely from a lead generation company that turns around and sells that information to dozens or hundreds of agents who will in turn contact the company and ask for an appointment.